6 Awesome Video Contest Examples

Video contests are a great way to generate viral growth for your business. They are perfect for getting more:

Facebook Fans

Email Leads

Engagement

Traffic

Social Sharing

This is because video contests are inherently viral in nature: The person who’s video entry in the contest gets the most votes wins. So every person who enters has a massive incentive to share the contest with all of their friends to get them to vote. This basically means they’re working for you to bring you free traffic and everything else I mentioned above.

Now let’s check out a few examples of amazing video contests to give you some inspiration and ideas for your own.

#1. VerveGirl: Beauty Vloggers Submit Makeup Tutorials

This video contest from VerveGirl asked beauty vloggers to submit videos of their best beauty tutorials. It gave these vloggers a chance to demonstrate their incredible makeup abilities to a huge audience. As the videos were of high quality and included serious knowledge, it got more people engaging and sharing.

Another thing that added to the success of the contest was that they gave daily prizes out to voters - which gave them a huge reason to come back to vote and share the contest every day. This helped the contest get over 1,400 participants in just 2 weeks.

#2. FilmScreenr: Filmmakers submit their crowdfunding projects

In this Video Contest, FilmScreenr has set up a contest for filmmakers to enter to win a “Project Spotlight” where the winner gets $300 and a year of free film-hosting on their site as well as being promoted on their social networks.

This contest is great because it was really providing a prize that would help their audience - independant filmmakers - instead of just giving them something that they might only marginally want. This is a great lesson to follow when deciding on your next prize: Make it something that will truly help solve a problem that your audience has. This will entice people far more than cash or unrelated product.

#3. The Hobbit: Ask Peter Jackson

This video contest from the The Hobbit asked Fans to submit videos of themselves asking the film’s director, Peter Jackson, a question they’d like him to answer. This gave Fans the ability to win something priceless: Having a personal conversation with someone whose work they greatly admire.

Now, you don’t have to be Peter Jackson to run this kind of video contest successfully. You can do this by asking Fans to submit questions for you that are in your own domain of expertise, such as cooking, home improvement or design. This can be done successfully by showcasing your experience, knowledge and accomplishments on the contest page, along with a photo of yourself to create a more personal connection with your Fans.

#4. Kampung Sembawang - Show your love for Singapore

This video contest asked residents of Singapore to submit a video saying why they love the island. This contest was timed perfectly to coincide with the 50th anniversary of Singapore’s independence from Malaysia. It built directly off of the audience’s patriotism and gave them a perfect outlet to showcase it.

You can do this for just about any major (or niche) holiday or season that your audience is interested in. For example, if you sell kitchenware, you could ask people to submit a video of your Fans preparing their family Thanksgiving dinner.

#5. Welcome to Sweden: Make our Judges Laugh

The NBC sitcom ‘Welcome to Sweden’ recently ran a video contest that asked Fans to submit a comedy sketch, with the goal being to make their panel of celebrity judges laugh. This contest actually had a 2-step winner selection system: In the first round, 10 winners were chosen based on public voting, and then one winner (from the 10 first-round winners) was chosen by the panel of judges.

You don’t need a celebrity panel of judges to do this. You just need to choose something that you or your team are experts in. For example, if you sell sports equipment, you can ask your audience to make a video of themselves performing a (safe) stunt for your panel of in-house judges.

#6. Henry’s: Show why your dog is ‘tops’

This video contest gets dog owners to submit a video of the thing they love the most: their dog. If your Facebook Newsfeed is anything like mine, it’s packed with pictures and videos of my friends’ kids and pets. So this is a great, fun opportunity for people to showcase their dogs, which they already love to do, to a much wider audience.

People love to show off the things they love, be it their pets, kids, cars, motorcycles or even their lunch. Find something that your audience loves to show off and ask them to submit a video of it for your next contest - they’ll love it!

Conclusion

Thanks for reading - I hope you found some inspiration for your next video contest.

If you have any questions for your next video contest, let me know in the comment section and I’ll be happy to answer them!

To learn more about Wishpond's contests, check out these free courses from Wishpond Academy: